DC Classics.Com: Club Infinite Earths Elasti-Girl Review

When Elasti-Girl arrived at the end of the last month, the first thing I said was, “finally.” If you’d asked me back in 2008 for my “Top Ten Characters that Need to be C&Cs” list, Elasti-Girl would’ve easily been in my top three. Instead, she ended up being what might be the last great oversized figure.

And, yes, I say that knowing that Elasti-Girl is the third-to-last oversized figure, but the next two just don’t seem the same. I am looking forward to both Lead & Mallah, but height is what impresses me when it comes to BAFs & C&Cs. Lead looks sharp, but he’s oversized on that Darkseid buck. Mallah looks fun, but, like Grodd, he won’t be doing much from the shoulders down. So Elasti-Girl is the one that Mattel’s going out on in my eyes. Hopefully, Mattel will figure out a better way to do some new oversized figures in the future, but until then Rita will remain a great example of what Mattel can do.

I didn’t gush as much in my Robotman or Negative Man reviews, but I absolutely love the Doom Patrol. They first appeared in My Greatest Adventure #80 back in 1963, but I wouldn’t find them until their stories were reprinted in the early 80s in the old DC Blue Ribbon Digest.*

That Digest reprinted four tales of the classic Doom Patrol and I was hooked! I wanted more, but that’s not how it worked out. I never really ran across them again. I didn’t read the Vertigo title as a kid. I didn’t have any access to the older issues. I sorta just forgot about them until Amalgam Comics X-Patrol awakened my memories of the team (Elasti-Girl had been merged with Wasp & Domino) and then I hunted down reprints and began reading the newer series. And I loved it. The original Haney still hold up. Morrison’s version is still trippy. The Doom Patrol has fallen on hard times since then though. They’ve been “New 52ed” several times in the last decade and I’ve found that I barely cared to read any of it. I don’t believe they’ve been “New 52ed” in the New 52 yet, but it’s only a matter of time until I sadly find myself again not buying a new book of one of my favorite classic teams.

* – Rita appeared on that cover with a long-sleeved red dress and purple gloves that flared out like her boots. That digest made such the impression that I’m probably the only person that would’ve preferred that look compared to the iconic version we received.

In the classic version, Rita Farr was an up-and-coming actress (& Olympic champion!) when she was inadvertently exposed to volcanic gases. Darn the luck, right? Those gases gave her the ability to manipulate her size from shrinking to a few inches tall or growing hundreds of feet tall. Essentially, she was DC’s answer to Attack of the 50 Foot Woman. Initially, she had no ability to control her size changes – which when you think about it, pretty much turns a cool super power into a useless pain in the ass. Dr. Niles Caulder helps her to better control her powers and adds her to the Doom Patrol as Elasti-Girl.*

* – By the way, don’t forget that hyphen! It’s the only thing separating her from The Incredibles Elastigirl. Pixar sought and received permission from DC to use the name, but Rita Farr will always be the true Elasti-Girl, even if she’s surely the second most well-known one now.

While Rita & the Doom Patrol might not be from the most visible corner of the DCU, getting the team in Classics has been something really important to me. While I still feel like Mattel needs to make Dr. Caulder (& Mento and a proper Beast Boy to a lesser extent) to make the team complete, it feels great having the roster together on the shelf! That’s particularly helped by the three figures being some of the best that Mattel & the 4H have done for the line.

Rita continues that trend. While many of us thought she could be easily done with Giganta pieces, Mattel surprisingly gave Rita a lot of new tooling. Mattel did reuse what they could from DCUC8’s Giganta, but that ended up only really being the upper arms, shoulders, and the legs from the waist to the knees.

The figure features an all new upper torso, lower arms, lower legs, and the head sculpt. While that might be expected for the retail line’s C&Cs, I’m grateful it was done for Club Infinite Earths, which has been producing decent figures despite being light on tooling. Continue to Page 2…

Ugh I am still in need of a finished Giganta. Though agree Rita rocks. I picked a collected Doom Patrol at the Library and got a much better liking of this group. That and a secret Six trade that had the group in it. Rita loses a leg though thanks to king shark and grows it back.

The mini.Rita I still have in the box so I won’t lose her. Those lil figs can get lost at times. I have to go finish Doom Patrol now but, wanna Ambush Bug and Bumblebee too.

am i the only one who thinks that the horsemen, while i love them, need some work on boobs? i understand, they’re sculpting in a static medium and real boobs are all about movement, but it always looks like, when you can see a gal’s rack from a horsemen line, the boobs look like big hard implants rather than hanging in a natural way. i understand completely that i’m nitpicky since i’m a serious boob fan, but for me, they just don’t looks good.

that said, you’re damned right batman is the man! seriously, chicks always fall for the brooding artsy type. he’s unfreakin’ stoppable in the poon department. seriously, the roster of batman’s loves is almost as long as the rogues gallery. i know it would never happen at retail, but i think a “the many loves of batman” would be a fresh subline… one hot chick figure, well sculpted, well articulated, necessary accessories, the package designed to look like a comic book, and then each release, you print the box so it looks like her first appearance issue.

And by “comic art of today” you mean since the 80s? That’s when the founding Image partners all got their start and the “bubble tits” look really took off, which influenced the next generation of artists with their commercial success. Of course, comic females have always been fairly well-endowed.

yeah, but that’s what weird about it… the boobs they sculpt tend to very silvestri or lee, but the horsemen grew up on ditko and kirby… all i’m saying is, every once in a while, i’d love to see a toy that’s sculpted more bisley or madureira or even wrightson or sam keith… something stylized differently or (GASP AT THE HORROR!!) realistic. i don’t mind big boobs, but then power girl should look like carrie kegan. but then again, i don’t need every comic-based gal to have F cups either. sam keith’s julie, from the maxx, was maybe a generous c cup, but the bubbly style of art made her incredibly hot, much moreso than mr pulido’s lady death w/ the G scale bubbly jubblies.

or to put it another way, i’d be beyond fine if the horsemen stepped away from the control art and tried something more personal w/ their sculpting style on comic book chicks. sure, they’re DC characters, but it’s the horsemen… let them have their own style.

Robotman got 52’d up in a new “My Greatest Adventure” limited. I don’t think sales were great, but it wasn’t bad.

Absolutely love Rita, though; probably more than I usually would since I didn’t think we’d ever get her. I was slightly annoyed to realize Robotman and Negative Man both have neck joints that can’t look up at her, though…

Absolutely great figure! Thats why I love this line. Thats why it definitely stinks that its down to about 12 figures a year. Unless they can sneak a c-list figure here and there in the DC Unlimited line instead of the umpteenth Batman variant (with exceptions for Zebra Batman)I cant get enough of them.

I ended up making a custom Niles Caulder. I took the head off a Marvel Legends Prof. X and then put on the extra head I had from the unmasked IE Starman. You Have to glue it in place because the neck pegs don’t match but it looks great. I painted the shirt white and the tie red. It is not a perfect figure by any means but it works with the group since I doubt we will ever get him from Mattel.

the w10 Beast Boy is actually in his DP colors. kinda. He was actually purple at that time, then somehow turned green and took up the red/white and lost the yellow Wolvie mask.
(can’t seem to find him in that color, but I know I’ve seen/shared it before! DP 99 shows him as green? brief retcon or I’ve skipped to another parallel world??)

Niles Caulder – the easy custom I think I first saw from Dan’l Pickett (Julius Marx), with the bearded Starman head on a suit body (MM Harvey, DCSH Clark Kent, or just use Walter Peck!) in Xavier’s movie wheelchair. It was passable, and only requires of Matty to make a wheelchair, if they can’t borrow one from Barbie.

Mento – new head and (re-used) hands on the Negative Man body.

I’m still annoyed neither Larry nor Raven came with a vinyl cling or even cardboard standee Negative/Soulself accy. 🙁

We also still need Madame Rouge for Beast boy to angst against (if only to face off against X-Men’s Rogue! LOL) and maybe Gen. Immortus. and Animal-Vegetable-Mineral Man!

To clarify on the Beast Boy color issue: he was always green, but when he joined the Doom Patrol, he wore a purple mask that covered his entire face with a Hawkeye style domino mask over it(yes, he wore a mask over a mask…).

My dad is possibly one of the world’s biggest Doom Patrol fans, so I’ve got all this stuff memorized backwards and forwards.

That’s a cool Perez cover on the Blue Ribbon digest. Kinda weird to see Rita in a redesigned costume at a time when she was still pushing up daisies. Or was that the suit she originally died in? I haven’t read the 60’s run but much like the Metal Men, I still welcomed the figures because they display nicely. All we need now is the Chief.

The head sculpt on Rita is my favorite part of the figure. The Horsemen captured the softness of Rita’s features in a manner which clearly resembles Premiani’s artwork.